Social Justice Must Cover Pollution and Health: President of India
The President of India, Ram Nath Kovind, inaugurated today the Constitution Day celebrations organized by the Supreme Court in New Delhi to mark the anniversary of the adoption of Constitution on November 26, 1949.
Speaking on the occasion, the President said that the Constitution is the modern scripture of independent India and it is more than just a collection of articles and clauses. For us Indians it is an inspirational and living document, an ideal of the society we are and the even better society we are striving to be.
The President said that in India, the idea of social justice too has expanded to encompass modern civic parameters – such as clean air; less polluted cities and towns, rivers and water bodies; sanitary and hygienic living conditions; and green and eco-friendly growth and development.
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These are all implications of environmental and climate justice, within the framework of social justice. If a child suffers from asthma due to air pollution it would be considered a gap in providing social justice, he said.
The President said that perhaps the most significant influence on justice is that of technology. Technology is an enhancer of justice as well as a challenge. It calls for us to think of technology justice as a subset of economic justice. This is very true in the context of access to technology for our poorer and less-privileged fellow citizens.
The President said that innovation has also worked for the benefit of disadvantaged sections of society. A case in point is India’s experience with technology-enabled, Aadhar-linked direct benefit transfers. These have plugged corruption, leakages and exclusion from India’s welfare programs.
The President said that innovation and technology have brought gains. But they have also brought questions of access and privacy. For example, he said, there is the dilemma of weighing data privacy against the use of data for the greater common good.
Within these competing imperatives lie competing notions of justice. And such issues will probably stay with us through the 21st century.
Photo courtesy: Press Information Bureau
